Acura ZDX

2013 Acura ZDX shown
Vehicle no longer in production

The 2013 model year represents the swan song year for Acura’s brazenly styled ZDX luxury crossover, which shares its dirty parts with the taller, seven-seat MDX. The big-boned ZDX hatchback is quite fun to drive and bathes its driver and front passenger in amenities galore, but its low roofline hampers rear-seat space and practicality. Short Take Road Test - 2010 Acura ZDX

2010 Acura ZDX

Seven-year-olds think it's the Batmobile.

We’re tempted to believe that ZDX stands for “zero demand expected.” The new Acura ZDX is one of those genre-less oddballs that occasionally comes along, like the Subaru Baja and the BMW X6. They slip past the guardians of sanity at their home offices and drift into the market like pollen wafting on a breeze of optimism.

They often die quickly and are flushed.

Long ago we described just such a spore, the AMC Gremlin, as a Hornet with the useful space hacked out of it. Behold the 21st-century version: Acura’s MDX luxury people mover with at least some of the useful space hacked—no, that’s old-fashioned, it’s been carefully shaved, planed, and CNC-milled out of it.

This is styling that takes a toll. To make a ZDX, an entire seat row from the MDX goes sayonara, as does about 35 percent of the cargo space with the seats folded. Width and wheelbase remain unchanged from the MDX, and length grows slightly, but the ZDX’s roof is more than five inches lower, pruning just over three inches from the rear-seat headroom.

Getting in back involves a limbo stoop under the low-cut opening. Have first aid at the ready because foreheads will be whacked, and an ungoggled eye or two may be poked by the rear-door glass, which comes to a menacing point at the concealed door handles.

The upside? At least one seven-year-old thought the ZDX was the coolest vehicle he’d ever seen. There are, like, 22-hundred-thousand buttons and a huge sunroof to stand up in and secret compartments in the back for ninja stuff and you can fly to Alaska in three seconds on the navigation screen and you can open the remote-control hatchback from about a mile away. And stuff.

All of which is ironic, as the ZDX will appeal mainly to people who don’t have kids. Acura predicts sales of just 6000 ZDXs per year, knowing full well that in America’s vastness one could find 6000 buyers for cars with square wheels.

Prices should start in the mid-40s, slightly higher than the MDX, but one like our test car, with the extra hundred-thousand buttons of the Technology package (upgraded leather, nav system, premium audio, backup camera, and more) and the Advance package (adaptive cruise control, adjustable suspension, blind-spot warning, precollision warning, etc.), will land in the mid-50s. Feature to feature, it’s less costly than the 300-hp BMW X6 xDrive 35i, which starts at $57,125, but that’s like saying an aardvark makes a better pet than an ostrich.

The ZDX isn’t lazy, hitting 60 mph in 6.4 seconds, rather fleet considering the 4421-pound curb weight (about 175 pounds lighter than an MDX). The 3.7-liter V-6 makes 300 horsepower, as it does in the MDX, and the new six-speed automatic and cylinder-cutoff system are mileage stretchers. We saw 20 mpg.

Nor does the ZDX fear a curve. It’s a confident, stable handler, thanks to some steering-feel improvements Acura made after our initial write-up. Also credit the system named with our favorite Japanese hyperbole, Super Handling All-Wheel Drive. When understeer attacks, the system overdrives the outside rear wheel to help turn this big bronco. It works.

On the pricey Advance-pack version, the electronic suspension—the “integrated dynamic system”—takes a page from the Corvette by fitting magnetorheological shock absorbers, or shocks filled with a fluid that changes viscosity—and thus stiffness—in instant concert with changes to electrical current. As with SH-AWD, this widget also works wonders, both restraining body motion and soothing over freeway impacts.

Acura supplies a dash dial to select comfort or sport modes. If, as expected, the ZDX spends most of its time circulating on city grids, it’s best to leave it in comfort mode and tape over the switch with a picture of your seven-year-old nephew, the one who thinks you’re Batman.

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